E 






4 

D73? 






859 




Glass. 
Book 



I 



I 



SPEECHES 






ipAT A rPA'D d * T\ATTri 



-r^-~- ■■-■■ 



Oxlii-i xl- J- vyi-tj '^e l\.t -L/v/UvJ.iJ 



ON TOE OCCASION OF HIS 



I 



PUBLIC RECEPTIONS 



BY THE CITIZENS OF 



NEW ORLEANS, PHILADELPHIA, AND 
BALTIMORE. 



WASHINGTON: 

PRINTED BY LEMUEL TOWERS, 

1869. 



E^-3 3 



IN EXCHANGE 






FEB 15 1915 



SPEECH 

OF 

SENATORS. A.DOUGLAS 

AT THE MEETING 

IN ODD-FELLOWS' HALL, NEW OELEANS, 

ON 

MONDAY EVENING, DECEMBER 6, 1858. 



Mr. President and Citizens of New Orleans: It was with much hesitation 
and no small degree of reluctance that I was induced to give my consent to ad- 
dress you on this occasion. I have just passed through a fierce conflict in my 
own State, which required me to perform more speaking than was either agree- 
able to my wishes, or consistent with my strength. When I determined to 
visit jS'ew Orleans, it was only on private business of an imperative character- 
and it was my desire to arrive and depart as quietly as possible, and without' 
in any way, connecting myself with politics. 1 approached your citj-, as I sup- 
posed, unheralded and unknown, and 1 was amazed at the magnificent recep- 
tion extended to me on the levee, by so vast a concourse of people, embiaciiif 
the_ municipal authorities, the citizens in their individual capacity, my own 
political friends, and men of all political parties. This was a compliment which 
tilled my heart with gratitude, and did not leave me at liberty to decline the 
first request you might make of me in return. I have, therefore, yielded to 
your solicitations, to make a few remarks on the political topics which now 
agitate the public mind throughout the length and bieadth of our glorious Re- 
public, and I have done so the more readily as I desire to know whether the prin- 
ciples, which are admitted to be sound and orthodox in the free States, can pass 
current in the slave States. 

So long as we live under a common Constitution, binding on the people of 
all the States, any political creed which can not be proclaimed in Louisiana as 
boldly as in Illinois, must be unsound and unsafe. 1 shall not attempt to enter 
upon any new views, or propound any original ideas with the view of testin<' 
the truth of this proposition, but shall simply discuss these questions now at issue 
in the country, in the same manner that I am in the habit of doing before an Illi- 
nois audience. The tendency of events during the past fifteen years, has been 
to force the organization of political parties on a geographical" basis, to array 
the North against the South, embittering the one against the other, under 
the misapprehension that there is some irreconcilable antagonism in their 
intenests which prevents harmony between them. For the last twenty-five years 
I have been in public life ; fifteen years have been spent in the Congress of 
the United States, and the whole of my life has been devoted to the discovery 
and elucidation of some common ground on which Northern and Southern men 
might stand on terms of equality and justice. If you will take pains to examine 
the history of this sectional strife which has grown up in our midst^ you will 
find that the whole contest has arisen from an attempt on the part of the Fede- 
ral Government to assume, or usurp, the exercise of powers not conferred by 
the federal constitution. When this Government was formed, the confederacy 
eoBsisted of thirteen States, twelve of which were slaveholding States, 



4 

while one was what i3 called a free State. Suppose the doctrine had 
then pi-evailed which was proclaimed by my opponent, Mr. Lincoln, in Illi- 
nois, by Mr. Seward, in ISew York, and by the leaders of tl)e Abolition 
or Black Republican party tliroughout the jS"orth — the doctrine that uni- 
xonniry in the donieslic institutions of the several States is necessary, that a 
house divided against itself cannot stand ; that this Government, divided into 
free and slave States, cannot endure ; that it must become all free or all slave ; 
that it ujii.st be all t'le one thing or the other — and what do you think would 
have been the result? Suppose that Mr. Seward himself had been a member of 
the Convention which framed the Constitution, and when the members came to 
aliix their signatures to that instrument, this doctrine of tiuiformity had been 
proclaimed, declaring that tho dijiueslic iu3„itutious of the several States must 
be the same, and wiiat would liave bten the effect? Would the one free State 
have outvoted the twelve slave States? On the contrarj' would not the twelve 
slave States have outvoted the one free State, and tlius slavery iiave been es- 
tablished in all the States forever by an irrevocable provision of the Constitu- 
tion? 

Why was this not done ? Simpl}' because the sages who formed our Govern- 
ment hnd nii^re at heart the great principles of civil liberty tlian the desire of 
sectional power or sectional advantage — because they wished to establish the 
principle that each State should possess the sovereign power of legislatioa over 
its owa domestic institutions — to form them and modify them to suit itself, re- 
taining s! vvery as long as it might desire to retain it, and abolisiiiug it when- 
ever it chose. This Government was formed on the principle of State-Rights 
and State Sovereignty, It is a confederacy of sovereign and independent States, 
having a certain common purpose, each retaining the right to manage its own 
affairs, and to maintain its_owu liberties inside of its own juiisdiction. 

It is a fatal heresy to prochiim the doctrine that there ought to be or can 
be uaifotmity among the different States of this LTnion, as to their local and 
domestic institutions. Uniformity is neither possible nor desirable. Our 
fathers knew, when they made this Government for so many different commu- 
nities, that thii-e must nec;,essarily be a corresponding variety in the laws and 
domestic institutions adapted to the wants and characteristics of each separate 
locality. They knew that variety and dissimilarity of local and domestic insti- 
tutions was an essential element in a confederated form (>f (Tovei-nu)ent. On 
this point you ;ind a vast diffei'ence between the Abolition or Black Republican 
party, on the <ine hand, and the Democratic party on the other. 

lleretofoi-e the effort lias been made, principally in the North, to array the 
Korth against the South and the South sigainst the North, embittering them 
against each other, until no Southern man would vote for a northern candidate, 
and no northern man would trust a southern candidate, and now the Black Re- 
publican party is attempting to effect this result by dechuing the docii-ine that 
the Union cannot continue to exist half slave and half free, and that it must 
becoui'^ all one thing or all the otlier. ' I can well understand how unstruj)ulous 
politi.iana in the North, who prefiT their own aggrandizement to the peace of 
the country and the perpetuity of the Union can advocate this doctrine. They 
belong to the str mger section, and think that they will be able to overwhelm 
the weaker. Bui. how long iias it been since these men in the North raised 
this clamor? Did we of the North, whilst you were in the maiority and we in 
the minority, ded- "-^ that the Union could not coiitinue to exist diviiled into 
free and slave Stti' > -,; Nol So long as the free Stales were the minority section, 
the North adhered to the doctrine that each State should manage its own domes- 
tic affairs without interference from the otlier States or from the Federal Gov- 
ernment ; but when, in the [wogress of events the free States increased until they 
obtained the mujnrity in the House of lleiiresentatives, and then a_tie in the 
Senate, ambitious men in the North found that by organizing sectional parties, 
belonging as ihcy did to the strongest section, they could ride into power The 
Black Republican or .\bolition parry is sectional in its organization, in its prin- 
ciples and in its whole line of policy. Kvery aig\imeiit used by it is addressed 
to Northern ambition, and is directed against the southern people and southern 
institutions, and it naturally has a baneful influence on some of the southern 



people, inducing them to try to form a southern party in opposition to it. Thus 
3-ou see the result of the attempts made to introduce the test, not -whether a 
representative is faithful to his own State and to the federal compact, but 
■whether he is true to the North or faitliful to the South. 

Let me remind you that the Constitution recognizes no sucli divisions. It 
recognizes no North and no Soutli, but one Rppublic under one Constitution, 
and thii'ty-two independent States, bound toi;fther by one federal compact. 
Hence I .eay to you that I owe no allegiance eitlier to tli'e North or to the South. 
My allegiance is to my own State, and througli that State, to the Federal Gov- 
ernment — and to no other power on earth, Let this principle be observed and 
acted upon in good failh, and there will always be peace between the North 
and the South, and between all the States of this glorious eonfederaej'. When 
I addressed this argument to Northern men — and especially to large crowds of 
Abolitionists, as I have often done — I have been answered that slavery is so 
great and monstrous an evil, that their consciences will not permit them to be 
quiet in regard to it even after they have performed their wholi^ duty in tlieir 
own State. They bring forward "the Declaration of Independence, "and read 
from it with wonderful satisfaction. I can give you their dogmas,'as presented in 
every Abolition Catechism. They take the Declaration of Independence, as I 
have said, and read this passage, -'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that 
all men are created equal, and endowed by their Creator Avith certain inaliena- 
ble rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Then 
they stop and say, "doesn't that Declaration tell us that all men are created 
equal? Is not a negro a man, and is he not, therefore, the equal of the wliite 
man?^ Was he not made equal by his Creator, and is his equality not, there- 
fore, inalienable by Divine law? Then how can you reduce him to an inferior 
position by any human law?'" 

By this specious, but sophistical argument, they have succeeded iu imposing 
on some weak-minded men, and some old women and children, un<ii they iuive 
educated a generation who really believe that the negro is their brother. And 
I must be permitted to tell you that many, even of j'our southern men, have 
quailed under that argument, and failed to meet it. My answer is this: When 
the framers of the Declaration declared that all men were equal, they had no 
reference whatever to the negro. They were speaking of Vi^hitt; men — men of 
European birth and European descent, and had no reference to the negro or to 
any other inferior and dependent race. And now for the proof, as I have here- 
tofore submitted it at home. When the Declaration was made, the colonies 
were all slave holding. Every man that signed the Declaration repi'esented a 
slave-holding constituency. Bearing these facts in mind, tell me if you believe 
that those men were such hypocrites as to admit the negroes belonging to them 
to be their equals by divine right, and yet hold those negroes in slavery the 
balance of their lives. Any man who asserts that the signers of the Declaration 
had reference to negroes in that document, declares every signer to have been 
a hypocrite, and worse than a h\'pocrite. 

I repeat, that this Government was made by white men, for the benefit of 
white men and their posterity forever, to be administered by white men, and 
none others. 

It is a law of humanity, a law of civilization, that whenever a man, or a 
race of men, show themselves incapable of managing their own affairs, they 
must consent to be governed by those who are capable of performing the duty. 
It is on this principle that j'ou establish those institutions of charity, for the 
support of the blind, or the deaf and dumb, or the insane. In accordance with 
this principle I assert that the negro race, under all circumstances, at all times 
and in all countries, has shown itself incapable of self-government. 

From these considerations, I arrive at the conclusion that the negro race being 
inferior, does not form any component element in the governing power of the 
American system of government. Yet, the negro is a human being, and as 
sucli is entitled to all the privileges and immunities which can be extended to 
him consistent with the safety of the society in which he lives. I presume 
that all men, North and South, of whatever politics, religion, or pi-cjudieee, 
will assent to the principle that humanity compels us to extend to the negro, 



and all other dependent races, all the privileges and immunities consistent with 
the good of the society in which they reside. Perha|>s j-ou will ask me, as the 
Abolitionist* have asked rae, what are these privileges and immunities — what 
their nature and extent? I return the same answer I have so often given them. 
It is a question for each State to decide for itself, independent of any other 
State or of the Federal Government. Illinois has decided the question for her- 
self. We have adopted a line of policy which has given satisfaction to us. If 
you do not like it, though we may regret your dislike, we must be permitted 
to say, with enlire respect, that it is none of your business. If you do not like 
our laws on the subject of negro slavery, or any other domestic concern, stay at 
home and live under such laws as you choose to make. The law in our Slate 
now is, that a negro shall not be a citizen, nor shall he be a slave ; but during 
our territorial existence, when the settlers were mainly from slave-holding States, 
bringing their slave property with them, the Territorial Legislature, in defiance 
of the celebrated ordinanee of 1787, established slavery in Illinois, and maintain- 
ed it for years. It was abolished because, from the circumstances of our climata 
and soil, and productions, it was found not to be profitable or conducive to our 
welfare. If we had lived fai'ther south, in the districts which produce sugar, 
and cotton, and rice, we would have seen just as much virtue in slave labor as 
3'ou do in Louisiana. And, perhaps, if some of the more excitable of our 
southern friends, happened to live among the granite hills of New Hamp- 
shire, they would entertain ver}' different views from those they now hold. 
This question of slavery is not a question of legislation at all, but of climate, 
soil, and self-interest. You can establish slavery nowhere by any law of Con- 
gress, or of a territorial legislature, or by any other power, contrary to the will 
of the people where it is to exist ; and, in mj' opinion, you should never be 
permitted to force it upon an unwilling people. 

Our kind friends over in Kentucky, when their servants became old and 
valueless, and a tax on their masters, showed their humanity by emancipating 
them and sending them into Illinois. Tiiis was also the case in other slave 
States, until Illinois was in danger of becoming a free negro colony, when she 
found it necessary to provide for her own protection by enacting that no more 
negroes should come to Illinois to reside, whether free or slave. Having de- 
termined not to have slavery, she would not establish a free negro colony for 
your benefit. Illinois says to the slave States, take care of your own negroes, 
make just such laws as you choose and be responsible to God and to your jios- 
terity. 

Let us alone and we will let you alone. That is the policy of Illinois in re- 
gard to slaver}- and the negro question. If you saj^^ you do not like that it 
cannot be helped. Illinois has just as much right to adopt her ]M)licy as you 
in Louisiana have to adopt a different policy. We are prepared to make a 
bargain with you, or rather to maintain inviolate the bargain our fathers made 
in the Federal Constitution — which enjoins upon every State the dutj- of mind- 
ing its own business and letting its neighbors alone. Under that principle this 
Union can exist forever — divided into free and slave States, each State having 
the right to preserve and retain slavery as long as it chooses, and abolish it 
whenever it j)leases. That is what I mean when I say that the Democratic 
party is a party devoted to State Rights and popular Sovereignty, in oppo- 
sition to that other policy which concentrates the liberties and rights of the 
people in the Federal Government. 

The discussion of this question in the North basso far modified publicopinion 
as to induce a willingness to acquiesce in its application to the States, but the 
Black l{ej)ublicans denj' the propriety of applying it to the Territories. 

C>n thi.^ point the Abolitionists assert the right of Congress, under the Con- 
stitution, to form and establish for the people of the Territories their domestic 
institutions, without their consent. Tlie Democratic party deny that Congress 
can rightfully exercise any such authority. 

We hohl, that for Congress to say to any people, j'ou sliall or shall not have 
such or such institutions, is a violation of the great ]>rinciples of our Federal 
Government. In the discussion of tlicse questions, 1 sometimes go back to the 
history of the revolution, and show that the same principles were involved, 



when the British Government attempted to pass laws for the Americaa colo- 
nieSj without giving them a representation in Parliament. 

In opposition to this claim our fathers rose up and said : We will obey these 
laws of Parliament, which are imperial laws, and not local laws — but we will 
not submit to local laws affecting our domestic institutions, and passed without 
giving us a fair representation in Parliament. The Democratic party now says 
that Congress has no right to establish or to prohibit slavery. We say that 
the Territories should be open to the citizens of the United States to go there 
with their property, subject alike to the laws, when they arrive there. But 
an objection is raised by some of our southern friends, and I have been asked 
here and at home, what I meant by the doctrine of popular sovereignty in the 
Territories, and whetlier we abide by the Dred Scott decision. In a discussion 
with my opponent, Mr. Lincoln, at Freeport, Illinois, the question was put to 
me whether, in the event of the people or Legislatiu-e of a Territory being hos- 
tile to slavery, there was any lawful means by which slavery could be excluded. 
I said yes, and proceeded to state the means. I will stale them here to you. 
The Democracy of Illinois, in the first place, accepts the decision of the Su- 
preme Court of the United States in the case of Dred Scott, as an authoritative 
interpretation of the Constitution. In accordance with that decision, we hold 
that slaves are property, and hence on an equality with all other kinds of 
propert}-, and that the owner of a slave has the same right to move into a 
Territory and carry his slave property with him, as the owner of any other 
property has to go there and carry his property. All citizens of the United 
States, no matter whether they come from the Xorth or the South, from a free 
State or a slave State, can enter a Territory with their property on an equal 
footing. And, I apprehend, when you arrive there with your property, of 
whatever description, it is subject to the local laws of the Territor}^ How can 
your slave property be protected without local law, any more than any other 
kind of property? The Constitution gives j-ou the right to go into a Territory 
and carry your slaves with you, the same as any other species of property ; but 
it does not punish any man for stealing your slaves any more than stealing any 
other kind of property. Congress has never ^-et passed a law providing a 
criminal code or furnishing protection to any kind of propert3^ It has simply 
Organized the Territorj- and established a Legislature, that Legislature being 
vested with legislative power over all rightful subjects of legislation, subject only 
to the Constitution of the United States. Hence whatever jurisdiction the Legis- 
lature possesses over other property, it has over slave property, no more no less. 
Let me ask you, as southern men, whether you can hold slaves anywhere unless 
protected by the local law? Would not the inaction of the local Legislature, 
its refusal to provide a slave code, or to punish offences against that species of 
property, exclude slavery just as effectually as a Constitutional prohibition? 
Would it not have that effect in Louisiana and in every other State? No one 
will deny it. Then, let me ask you, if the people of a Territory refuse to pass 
a slave code, how are you going to make them do it? When yoti give them 
power to legislate on all rightful subjects of legislation, it becomes a question 
for them to decide, and not for yon. 

If the local Legislature imposes a tax on horses, or any other kind of proper- 
ty, you may think it a hardship, but how are you going to help it? Just so it 
is with regard to traffic in liquors. If you are dealing in liquors, you have the 
same right to take your liquor into the Territory that anybod}- else has to take 
any other species of property. You may pass through and take your liquors 
in transitu, and you will be protected in your right of property under the Con- 
stitution of the United States; but if you open the packages they become sub- 
ject to the local law ; and should the Maine law happen to prevail in the Ter- 
ritory, you had better travel with your liquors. Hence, if the local Legislature 
has the same power ovef slave property as over every other species of property, 
what right have you to complain of that equality ! But if you do complain 
where is your remedy ? And let me say to j-ou that if you oppose this just 
doctrine, if you attempt to exempt slaves from the same rules that apply to 
every other kind of property, you will abandon your strongest ground of 
defence against the assaults of the Black Republicans and Abolitionistsi If the 



8 

people of a Tenilory are in favor of slavery they will make laws to protect it; 
if opposed to slavery they will not make those laws and you can not compel 
them to do it. But I will t<ill you when they will have it, and when slavery 
will find protection in a Territory. It is when the territory lies in those lati- 
tudes and climates which adapt it to the profitahle production of rice and 
sugar and cotton, and where slave labor will be remunerative. Thus, slavery 
will exist wherever soil, climate, and productions demand it, and it will exist 
nowhere else. Now, if climate, and soil, and self-interest will regulate this 
question, why should we quarrel about it? When you arrive at a certain dis- 
tance to the North of the line there can not be any doubt of the result : and 
so when you go a certain distance South the result will be equally certain 
the other way. But in the great central regions, where there may be some 
doubt as to the efi'ect of natural causes, who ought to decide the question ex- 
cept the people residing tlieVe, who have all .their interests there; who have 
gone there to live with their wives and children? Any party which at- 
tempts, by a system of coercion, to force any institutions into regions not 
adopted to them, violates the great principles on which our Government is 
founded. 

You now have my views on the subject of slavery in the Territories. Prac- 
tically, they amount simply to this : If the people waut slavery they will have 
it; if they do not want it they will not have it, and you cannot force it upon 
them. If these principles be recognised and adhered to, we can live in peace 
and harmony togethei'; but just as surely as you attempt to force the people to 
have slavery, against their will, in regions to which it is not adapted, fanaticism 
will take control of the Federal Government. 

It was OB these principles that, last winter, I resisted the admission of Kansas 
under the Leoompton constitution. I have said, what I repeat here, that my 
opposition was not based upon any provision in that constitution relating to 
the subject of slavery. I then said" that if Kansas wanted to be a slaveholding 
State, she had a right to be so, and if she wanted to be a free State, she had 
the same right. If the Leeompton constituUon was an embodiment of the peo- 
ple's will, it ought to have been accepted. If it was not an embodiment of 
their will, it ought not to have been forced upon them. And now let me reason^ 
with you, as southern men, on this question. If we are going to live in peace 
together, v.e must act in harmony in the application of all just and fair princi- 
ples. Suppose that, last winter, "we had had an Abolition President, an Abo- 
lition majority in both Houses of Congress, and that Kansas had luid an 
Abolition Governor and authorities. Suppose that by some means— just such 
means as those by which the Leeompton convention was called — a convention 
had assembled composed of Abolitionists. Suppose the understanding to have 
been that the constitution was to be submitted to the people; that the conven- 
tion had assembled, and it was discovered that the pro-slavery men were in a 
majority of five to one in the Territory. Suppose, under these circumstances, 
the convention had refused to submit the constitution to the people, and had 
attempted to force an Abolition constitution down the throats of a pro-slavery 
people against their will. Would you, the }.eople of the South, have submitted 
to such a wrong? Would you have suffered an Abolition constitution to be 
forced down the tliroats of the people of any Territory in opposition to their 
wishes, more especially had such a constitution contained a provision that it 
should not be changed for seven years, and not then excej>t by a two-thirds 
vote; so that the minority having once fastened it on the people, that same 
minority could perpetuate' it forever in opposition to the wishes of the majority. 
Now, if I do not mistake the southern character and southern patriotism, you 
would never have submitted patiently and calmly to such an attempt to violate 
the great principles of ^elf-government. I am not g'>i;ig to ei.ter upon a dis- 
cussion as to wlu'ther this constitution was the act of lly ))eo]ilo o{ Kansas. If 
it was not their act, then 1 was right in opposing it; if it was their act, then 
you can draw your own inferences. 1 will only say now, that il was sent back 
to the jieople of Kansas under the provisions "of the English bill, which sub- 
mitted the question in an indirect manner, and was rejected by a vote of eight 
to one. Under these cirouu^stances, who can say that it ever was the act of 



9 

the people of Kansas. But I am not going to re-open that question. It is now 
settled. Let the asperities growing out of the controversy die with the con- 
troversy. 

All I ask is, that in future we recognize the right of the people of a Territory 
to form a free State, or a slave State, as they may choose, and come into the 
Union on an equality with the other States. 

A few words more and I have done. I will only say to you, in conclusion, 
that if we recognize and observe this principle of State rights and self-govern- 
ment for the people of the Territories, there will be peace forever between the 
North and South, and America will fulfil the glorious destiny which the Al- 
mighty has marked out for her. She will remain an example for all nations, 
expanding as her people increase and her interests demand moi-e territory. I 
am not in favor of the acquisition of territory by fraud, violence, or improper 
-means of any kind; on the contrary, I would never permit the Federal Gov- 
ernment to be an instrument in the hands of foreign powers to carry out 
their purposes upon the American Continent. Let us adopt a policy consistent 
with our destiny, and then bide our time. 

[Mr. Douglas was apparently about to bring his remarks to a close at this 
point, when", in response to calls of Cuba! Cuba! from the audience, he pro- 
ceeded thus:] 

It is our destiny to have Cuba, and it is folly to debate the question. It 
naturally belbngs to the American Continent. It guards the mouth of the Mis- 
sissippi river, which is the heart of the American Continent and the body of 
the American nation. 

Its acquisition is a matter of time only. Our Government should adopt the 
policy of receiving Cuba as soon as a fair and just opportunity shall be presented. 
Whether that opportunity occur next year or the year after, whenever the oc- 
casion arises and the opportunity presents itself, it should be embraced. 

The same is true of Central America and Mexico. It will not do to say we 
have territory enough. When the Constitution was formed, there was enough, 
yet, in a few years afterwards, we needed more. We acquired Louisiana and 
Florida, Texas and California, just as the increase in our population and our 
interests demanded. AVhen, in 1850, the Clayton-Bulwer treaty was sent to the 
Senate for ratification, I fought it to the end. They then asked what I wanted 
with Central America. I told them I did not want it then, but the time would 
come when we must have it. They then asked what my objection to the treaty 
was. I told them I objected to that, among other clauses of it, Avhich said 
that neither Great Britain nor the United States should ever buy, annex, colo- 
nize, or acquire any portion of Central America. I said I would never consent 
to a treaty with any foreign power, pledging ourselves not to do in the future 
whatever interest or necessity might compel us to do. I was then told by 
veteran Senators, as my distinguished friend well knows, (looking towards Mr. 
Soule,) that Central America was so far off that we should never want it. I 
told them then, "Yes; a good v/ay off— half way to California, and on the 
diiect road to it." I said it was our right and duty to open all the highways 
between the Atlantic and the Gulf Sta'tes and our possessions on the Pacific, 
and that I would enter into no treaty with Great Britain or any other Govern- 
ment concerning the affairs of the American continent. And here, without a 
breach of confidence, I may be permitted to state a conversation which took 
place at that time between myself and the British Minister, Sir Henry Lytton 
Bui wer, on that point. He took occasion to remonstrate with me that my position 
with regard to the treaty was unjust and untenable; that the treaty was fair 
because"" it was reciprocal, and it was reciprocal because it pledged thafneither 
Great Bi-itain nor the United States should ever purchase, colonize, or acquire 
any territory in Central America. I told him that it would be fair if they 
would add one word to tlie treaty— so that it would read that neither Groat 
Britain nor the United States should ever occupy or hold dominion over Central 
America or Asia. But he said: "You have no interests in Asia;" "No," an- 
swered I, " and you have none in Central America." ^^ 

"But," said he, "you can never establish any rights in Asia." J' No, said T, 
" and we don't meaa that you shall ever establish any in America." I told him 



10 

it would be just as respectful for us to ask that pledge in reference to Asia, as 
it was for Great Britain to ask it from us in reference to Central Amerioa, 

If experience shall continue to prove, what the past may he considered to 
have demonstrated, that those little Central American powers cannot maintain 
self-government, the interests of Ciiristendom require that some power should 
preserve order for them. Hence, I maintain that we should adopt and observe 
a line of policy in unison with our own interests and our destiny. I do not 
wish to force things. We live in a rapid age. Events crowd upon each other 
with marvelous rapiditj-. I do not want territory any faster than we can oc- 
cupy, Americanize, and civilize it. I am no fiUibuster. I am opposed to un- 
lawful expeditions; but on the other hand, I am opposed to this country acting 
as a miserable constabulary for France and England. 

I am in favor of expansion as fast as consistent with our interest and the in- 
crease and development of our population and resources. But I am not in 
favor of that policy unless the great principal of non-intervention and the 
right of the people to decide the question of slavery, and all other domestic 
questions, for themselves shall be maintained. If that principle prevail, we 
have a future befoi'C us more glorious than that of any otiier people that ever 
existed. Our Republic will endure for tliousands of years. Progress will be 
the law of its destiny ; it will gain new strength witli every State brought into 
the Confederacy. Then there will be peace and harmony between the free 
States and the slave States. The more degrees of latitude and longitude em- 
braced beneath our Constitution, the better. The greater tlie variety of pro- 
. ductions, the better; for then we shall have the principles of free trade apply 
to the important staples of the world, making us the greatest planting as well 
as the greatest manufacturing, the greatest commercial as well as the greatest 
agricultural power on the globe. 

These are my views in regard to our foreign relations. They are questions 
I had not intended to discuss; and I should not have done so if some gentleman 
in the crowd had not called my attention to them. My votes in Congress have 
always been in harmony with the line of policy I have here marked out. It 
matters not whetiier you acquire more territory, or how much or how little 
you wish to acquire. Expansion is the law of our existence; when we cease 
to grow, we commence to decline. Hence our course is onward, on the princi- 
ple established by our fathers, under divine inspiration, as I believe, in the 
formation of the Government. 

And now permit me to return my grateful acknowledgements for tlie kind- . 
ness with which you have listened to me, and to retire. 



SPEECH 

AT 

INDEPENDENCE HALL, PHILADELPHIA, 

TO THE 

MAYOR, COUNCIL, AND CITIZENS COMMITTEE, 

JANUARY 4, 1859. 



"Wm. E. Lehman, Esq., on belialf of the citizens' committee, introduced Sen- 
ator Douglas to the Mayor and Councils. He said: 

Mayor Henry: It was my agreeable duty to be one of the committee ap- 
pointed to go to New York, and wait upon the distinguished Senator of Illinois, 
and extend to him a cordial invitation to visit our city. lu the perforniance of 
that duty, I not only represented his personal and political friends, but, in a 
measure, the corporate authorities of the city. I informed Senator Douglas 
that the Councils of the city, without distinction of party, had unanimously 
tendered him the use of Independence Hall to receive his friends, and that it 
was y6ur intention, as Chief Magistrate of this municipality, to welcome him. 
I deem it proper to state that the Senator, in his repl}', consented to waive all 
his private arrangements, and to forego engagements of a pressing public na- 
ture, to accept this grateful tribute of respect. It is with great pleasure that 
I now introduce to you the illustrious Senator. 

Mayor Henry then addressed Senator Douglas in the following: 

Mr. Senator: The Councils of Philadelphia have tendered you, in passing 
through this city, the use of the Hall of Independence for the reception of your 
friends, and in their name I welcome you upon this occasion. 

This spot is the common heritage of American freemen. Within these walls, 
memorable for the most illustrious deed in our country's history, hallowed more 
than once by the ashes of the mighty dead, cherished as the depository of the 
mementoes "of patriots and heroes, all other sentiments merge in that of unal- 
loyed devotion to the Union, its prosperity and its perpetuity. 

I greet you, sir, as a member of those National Councils on whom devolves 
the guardianship of our nation's interest and destiny; as one whose eminent 
position in those councils has elicited the admiration and respect of so many 
of your fellow-citizens. 

Permit me, individually, to express my wishes for your personal welfare, and 
the assurance that the hospitality of Philadelphia will be well cared for by 
your surrounding friends. 

Senator Douglas's Speech. 

Senator Douglas, in response, said: Mr. Mayor — It has fallen to my lot, as a 
public man and as a politician, to receive many testimonials from political and 
partisan friends, which, under the circumstances, were most grateful to my 
feelings; but the tender of the use of this hall voluntarily, as I am informed, 
by the unanimous sentiment of the corporate authorities of the city of Phila- 
delphia — this hall, within whose sacred precincts no thought or no sent.iment 
can enter any citizen's breast inconsistent with the peace of the Republic and 
the perpetuity of the Union— is a compliment that overwhelms me with grati- 



12 

tude. In this hall ■v^'e find the pictures, and we feel the influence of the spirit, 
of those sages and patriots to whom we owe our independence and our 
constitutional form of government. Here that sentiment which now ani- 
mates all the free tjovernments of the eaith first found its authoritative ex- 
position and proeiiimntion. The'i-e stands the bell which " ])roelaiiued liberty 
throughout the land, unto all the inh:ibitants tliereof ;" and it seems as if the 
inscription it bi'ai'S was directed by the hand of Divine Providence, for it was 
placed upon it far in advance of the period when any Immnn brain could 
foresee that it was to be used to proclaim the independence of America over 
the arbitary decrees of a British Paidiament. A great principle proclaimed 
by the ftithers of the Republic in this hall, was the right of the people of all 
the States, of all the jjrovinces and dependencies, and of every community, 
to regulate its own domestic concerns and internal affairs in its own way. 
Pennsylvania hn'; always been true to that cardinal principle of representative 
governm'^rit. Pennsylvania, with her Franklin, and those congenial spirits 
who ga\e impulse to the Revolution, foresaw that the time might come, 
when, aftfr having maintained her independence against the British Parlia- 
ment, another imperial parliament might be established on her own continent 
equally destructive to the liberties of the people and the rights of the citizens, 
and hence Pennsj'lvania, in her instructions to her delegates wlio represented 
her in this hall, when she anticipated the Declaration of Independence, em- 
powered them to give her assent to that declaration on the fundamental con- 
dition that Pennsylvania retained unto herself forever the right to ma aee her 
local and domestic concerns and police regulations in her own way, indepen- 
dent of an}'' other power on the face of the globe. 

Sir, If we remain true to these great principles of constitutional liberty pro- 
claimed by our fathers in this hall, and consummated by the Constitution of 
the United States within the precincts of Philadelphia, this Union may last 
forever as our forefathei's made it, each State retaining just such local and 
domestic institutions as it shall choose. If my devotion to these constitu- 
tional, C" iservative jirineiples of liberty have attracted to me the attention of 
tlie constituted authorities of this vast citj-, it is a great reward for all of the 
toils that have accompanied my public life. I a])preciate it a thousand times 
more than any partisan trium{)h which a transient politician may acquire in 
the road through life, for such a triumph must necessarily be ephemeral in its 
character. 

Mr. Mayo?", discarding rfll partisan spirit, as you have done, I accept this 
honor with a grateful heart. I have not the vanity that would receive it as a 
mark of personal respect. I am glad to know that I have the esteem individu- 
ally of yourself; but it is far more grateful to me, as a public num, to know 
that yovr sj-mpathy is ai'oused by public duties calculated to sustain and per- 
petuate those principles of civil and religions liberty which our fathers have 
transmitted to us. May we be successful in handing down to our children, and 
through our children to our last posterity, those immortal princiides which 
were first procliimcd in this Hall, the witnesses of which stand now, like guar- 
dian angels, looking down upon our every act, and ins]iiring our jirayers to 
Heaven that this Union, this C<)nstitution,'these States, as they e.xist, and hav« 
existed, may last forever, not only for the protection of our own people, but as 
a guide to the friends of freedom throughout the world. 

Jleturning my grateful acknowledgements, I can onlj- say that when I leave 
here I shall cni'ry with me a recollection of tiiis day which will never bo effaced 
while life lasts, and over the memor}' of which, I trust, my children will feel 
more proud than of any act that has heretofore marked my public life. 



SPEECH 



THE CITIZENS OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND, 

ON 

THE EVEKINCt of JANUARY 5, 1859, 
Wiicia Seresiadc'tl I»y iJiewi at tSae GiSuiore Ho»isc, 



Mr. Douglas having been introduced, said: 

Fkllow-citizens of Baltimore: It was my expectation to liave passed quietly 
through your city, as it has been my custom for th.; last fifteen years, upon my 
way to the Xatioual Capitol. Xo longer ago than yesterday, I sent a tele- 
grapliic despatch to my family, informing them that they might expect me 
there to-night, when 1 was notified that my fellow-citizens of this beautiful 
city had appointed a committer to meet me half way beUveen this and Phila- 
delphia, and escort me here. I did not feel at libei ty .to disregard their kind re- 
quest. I was more willing to stop and spend a iiigliL with you, hvd exchange 
my opinions with vours, Ibr the reason that I desire to know v.-hetlier my prin- 
ciples may be avowed in a slave State the same as in a free Stale — in the South 
and in the North alike, whei-ever tlie American flag waves over the Americaa 
8oiL So long as we live under the Constitution, any political creed which can 
not be avowed in the same terms, and sustained by the same arguments in 
every State in the Union, must be a fatal heresy. 

Principles to be sound must be the same in Maryland as they are in the 
North ; the same in New Orleans as they are in New York and New England; 
the same in the slaveholding States as they are in the free States. AVe have 
been precipitated for tht luHr .u,ir years into a fearful sectional struggle,^ in 
which the North has been rallied against the South, and the South rallied 
against the North on this negro question. . 

What I desire to know is, whether there is not a common ground of funda- 
mental principles under all our institutions, upon which northern and southern 
men can stand togethei', as brethren, without their surrendering any right 
which belongs to them under the Constitution. 

Equality among the dilFerent States is a fundamental principle, and as a 
natural consequence from that equality of States results equality of the citi- 
zens of all the States of the Union. Any political creed is wrong that threatens 
injustice to any section or to any State, or the inhabitants thereof, in order to 
benefit any other State or any other section. We have recently been told, first 
in Illinois by the champion of Abolitionism, and subsequently in New York by 
Mr. Seward, that this Union cannot endure divided into free and slave States as 
our fathers made it. We have been told that these States must become all free 
or all slave; that they must be all one thing, or all be the other, otherwise that 
this Union cannot endure. In other words. Abolitionism seems to suppose that 
there must be uniformity in the domesti(! instituticcis of all the States. Diver- 
sity among the local and domestic institutions- is the inevitable result oi our 
political system. Uniformity is neither possible nor desirable. Our fathers, 
when they formed this Union, knew that, in a Republic as broad and as expen- 
sive as this, with such a variety of climate, soil and productions, there must 
necessarily be a corresponding variety in the local and domestic institutions of 
each State, adapted to the wants, conditions, and interests of each locality. 



14 

TThy was this Union formed originally, -with thirteen independent sovereign- 
ties, each with a seperate Legislature of its own, and the right to make such 
laws as it desired, unless it was expected that each State had interests differing 
from every other and requiring laws and institutions in some respect difl'erent? 
Our fathei's knew that tne laws and institutions which were well adapted to 
the granite hills of New England, were not well suited to the tobacco planta- 
tions of Maryland. They knew that each locality' required dift'ei'ent laws 
adapted to its own interests; and hence, that each State must have a Legisla- 
ture of its own to attend to its domestic concerns. If you will examine the 
history of the Revolutionary struggle, you will tind that your own beloved 
State would not consent to the Declaration of Independence except on the fun- 
damental condition that Maryland should retain forever the right to regulate 
her domestic concerns and internal affairs to suit herself, without interference 
from any other State or from the P'ederal Government. 

You have regulated your affairs to suit yourselves, you have prescribed what 
shall be the relative position of the negro and the white man in Maryland. I 
shall not stop to inquire whether your decision is wise or unwise; that is your 
business, not mine. All I have to say is, you have a right to decide that ques- 
tion for yourselves, and having decided it, we have no right to meddle with 
that decision. If we do not like your laws all we have to do is to stay away 
where we will not come under their operation. So it is in the State of Illinois; 
she is a sovereign power as well as Maryland. We have ado^ited a different 
system of polic}- in some respects from yours. "We have as much right to pre- 
scribe our policy as you have to adopt yours, and we are prepared to make a 
bargain with J'ou, or rather we are prepared to stand by that bargain which 
our fathers made in the Federal Constitution, to let you attend to your own af- 
faii's and mind your own business, you leaving us alone to attend to our affairs 
and mind our business. It is none of your business whether we have negroes 
or not. If you want them, have them; if you do not want them, exclude 
them. 

It is none of our business whether j-ou have slaves or not. So long as you 
beliese it is to your interest to retain African slaverj- do so, and when you get 
tired of it, abolish it ; but do not humble yourselves or tarnish your sovereignty 
by taking advice from Congress upon that subject. That is what we north- 
western Democrats mean b}' popular sovereignty. When this Union was 
formed it consisted of twelve slaveholding States and one free State. Acting 
on this principle of popular sovereignty, each State being left to di'cide for 
itself, the New England States abolished slavery; then New York; then New 
Jersey, and then Pennsylvania. Uuder what principle was it that slavery dis- 
appeared from those States, except it was that of the right of the people of each 
State to decide for themselves? In New England they abolished slavery when 
they found that it was contrary to their interests to continue it. We in Illi- 
nois, while a Territory, established African slavery in defiance of the ordinance 
of 1787, and we tried it for many years, until we came to form a constitution 
for admission into the Union as a State. By that time we had discovered that 
in our climate, with our soil and our surroundings, it was not to our interests to 
continue it, and therefore we abolished it. If we had found that onr climate, 
our soil, and our j)roductions required negro labor, we would have held on to 
it with the same tenacity as the other slave States. 

Permit me here to 1-emark that this Slavery question rests upon laws higher 
than those of legislative enactment. It depends upon the laws of climate, of 
production, and of self-interest. Wherever cotton, and sugar, and rice, and in- 
digo are the Btai)le articles, and the climate is such as to exclude white labor, 
the negro must take the place of tiie white man on the )>laiitation. When 3'ou 
get into those hot climates, it is not a struggle between tiie negro and the white 
man, but a struggle between the negro and the crocodile, which shall occupy 
the Delta line. In tiiose Delta lands slavery must exist, negro labor must be 
en)i)loyed, otherwise their cultivation must be abandoned, wiule in those high 
northern latitudes, where the earth is covered with deep snows, and where 
there is a severe climate, illy adapted to the constitution of the negro, and bet- 
ter united to the white man, slavery can never exist, because it is not the in- 



15 



terest of the people to have it. Tlie only diiBculty in regard to this slavery 
question is that there is a medium climate, and it may be controverted whether 
Buch a climate is best adopted to white or black labor. Who shall decide the 
contest there unless it be those who live there, who have moved there with their 
wives and children, made it their home, and have a better opportunity of judg- 
ino- what they want than those residing at a distance. Hence leave this ques- 
tion to climate, to self-interest, to the decision of the peopk interested, and 
there will be peace, harmony and fraternity, among all the States of this Con- 

In accordance with this principle I brought forward the bill to blot out the 
Missouri Compromise line— that black line which ran across the Continent, fix- 
ing a stigma upon the local and domestic institutions ot half of the States of 
this Union — in oi'der to substitute in its place the great fundamental principle 
of self-government, upon which all our f]-ee institutions rest. Now, whyshould 
not that principle prevail. Perhaps it does not suit Abolitionists and agitators, 
but it does suit the great mass of the people, who only want such laws as are 
adapted to their interests, and who best know what those laws shoul(4,be. 

I know +hat there are those who believe that slavery is such a crime that it 
should be abolished at any risk. I hold that it is the right of the peopleto de- 
cide for themselves whether it is crime or not. Those who hold that it is, tell 
us that the Declaration of Independence declares all men to have been created 
equal, and assuming that this declaration includes the negro, demand that he 
shall be placed on an equality with the white man. My answer to that argu- 
ment is this— the signers of the Declaration of Independence had no reference 
whatever to the negro, when they declared all men to have been created equal. 
They were speaking of white men ; of men of European birtli and descent, and 
nobody else, when they declared the equality of all men. This government was 
founded on the white basis; it was made by white men, for the benefit of white 
men, to be aduiinistered by white men. liut it does not follow by any means 
that'because tlie negro is no component part of this government, because he is 
not a citizen, and ought never to be a citizen, that he must necessarily be a 
slave. On the contrary, it does follow that you should extend to the negro, 
and to every other dependent race, all the rights, all the privileges, and all the 
immunities which can be safely given him consistent with the good of society. 

On that principle alone all men ought to agree. But, when you come to ap- 
ply the principle, you will ask me what are the rights and privileges that I 
would give the negro. My answer is, that is a question whicli the people of 
each State must decide for themselves. It may be proper to grant to the negro 
in Illinois privileges which it would not be safe to give him in Maryland, and 
hence it is a question for us to decide for ourselves in that State, and tor you to 
decide for vourselves in this State. So it is with all other domestic relations; 
each State must decide for itself what the relation shall be, not only between 
master and servant, but between husband and wife, parent and child, guardian 
and ward- and, also, what shall be the banking system, the school system, the 
railroad system, and every other system, affecting their rights, their persons, 
and their property. Let these principles of State rights and State sovereignty 
prevail, and tliere will be no cause for jealousy and collision between the ditter- 
ent States and Territoies. Let these principles be applied in good faith, and 
then this Government is capable of indefinite expansion, and will expand as 
fast as we need more territory and find it to our interest to acquire it. 

We are a growing nation, increasing and spreading every year; for the pre- 
sent, we ha%^e territory enough, but we must enlarge our borders as fast as wc 
fill up that territory, and must Americanize that which adjoins us. Let us then 
pursue a policy both foreign and domestic, consistent with the destmy which 
the Almighty has marked out for us. I never have and never will give a vote 
for a treaty which binds the American people never to do on the American con- 
tinent that which our interest, our honor and safety may compel us to do. 1 
felt it my duty to resist the Clayton and Bulwer treaty when it was "lade. I 
objected especially to that clause of it which said that neither the United States 
or Great Britain would in all future time, annex, colonize, or exercise dominion 
oyer any portion of Central America. I wai asked what I wanted with Cen- 



16 

tral America then. I replied that we did not want it then, but that the time 
might come when we ■would want it. I was told that it was so far off that we 
could never desire it. My answer was that it was a good ways off, about half 
way to California, and on the direct route to it; and if California was not too 
far off for us, I did not see, how the half-way house could be too remote for 
our wishes and desires. 

The time may come when we shall be compelled for the sake of our own in- 
terests, and for that of humanity, commerce and stable goverumuit, to annex 
Province after Province of Mexico, and to take Cubatoo.and to ex])and indefi- 
iiitel}'-, yet steadily and slowly, acquiring territory as we Americuuize it and 
need it, until this nation shall become one ocean-bound Republic. It may not 
be iu yoLir lifetime nor in mine; it may not be in the lifcthue of our children ; 
but I trust that the saying applied to other countries is true of ours, that the 
nation never dies. I trust the American nation will survive forever. If it does, 
it must expand, for to increase, multiply, and grow, is the constitutional law of 
our existence. Hence, let us pursue a foreign policy by which we will have 
control of our own actions at all times with i-eferenee to the xVn^erican conti- 
nent, and which will leave us free when the time comes to do that which we 
or our children, as the case may be, may determine that our interest and 
safety require us to do. But that foreign policy must be accompanied with a 
domestic policy, which preserves the rights and sovereignty of the States, and 
protects each Stale in the right to decide its institutions for itself, and hence 
avoids any jar or collision when new States are admitted into the brotherhood. 
With this domestic policy there can be no occasion for strife between the fre« 
and slave States. 

My friends 1 have given you an epitome of the principles which I discussed 
in Illinois in the late contest with the Abolitionists and their allies, I appealed to 
the jjeople of Illinois by their love for the American Union, to preserve sacred 
the fraternal feeling between the old and the new, the free and slave States; 
I pointed them to Bunker hill, to Bennington, to Saratoga and to Monmouth ; 
I pointed them to King's Mountain, Guilford Court House, and to Yorktown; I 
showed them that in the Revolution, northern and southern men stood shoulder 
to shoulder in a common cause, fought under the same banner, poured out their 
blood in common streams, and shared common graves to secure tlie liberty^ which 
We now enjoy. Why cannot northern and southern men live under this Con- 
stitution iu the same spirit in which our fathers framed it. We can if we will 
observe between the different States, that good old rule which our mother's 
taught us — that golden rule which evei'y good mother teaciies nor aun \n hen he 
goes abroad, my son remember to mind your own business and leave your neigh- 
bor's alone. That advice is as applicable to States, Territories, and communities, 
as it is to individuals. 

M}' friends, it has been ray duty during the summer to talk more than was 
consistent with my strength or agreeable with my feelings. 1 had determined 
that i would proceed quietly to tlie Capital, without niakiig an^- more speeches, 
but when I found my fellow-citizens of Maryland, of this great city of Balti- 
more, sym|>athising witli the people of the ^I'orth in belialf of sound constitu- 
tional principles, i could not refrain from stopping and exchanging sentiments, 
in order to see if we did not advocate the same pi-inciples and entertain the 
same pati'iotic regard for the CwJistitulion under which we live. 1 believe that 
if these principles are lirnily adhered to and faithfull}' carried out, this gloi-ious 
Union can exist forever, divided into free and slave States, as ourfatliers made 
it, each State retaining the right to have just sucli laws and institutions as it 
may choose, and to modify and change tliem as it ma}" see proper. I renew to 
you my grateful acknowledgments for the kind and respectful manner in which 
you iiave listened to me, and beg to bid you good night 



LRB S 16 



